A California Christmas
Page 15
But when he found his gaze migrating back to the two of them again and again, that tingle of awareness—that sense that she might mean trouble for him in some way—ran through him again. Could it be that Thursday night had meant more to him than it should have?
“How long is this song?” he suddenly blurted out.
Gavin and Eli blinked at him. Only then did he realize he’d interrupted a conversation he’d been pretending to listen to.
“Why are you in such a hurry for it to be over?” Gavin asked.
Dallas scowled to cover the gaffe. “I just... I thought we were going over to play beer pong.”
His response sounded weak, even to his own ears.
“There’s still plenty of time for that,” Eli said. “What’s the rush?”
“There isn’t one,” he mumbled. After that he didn’t dare show any impatience for fear his brothers might misconstrue his concern.
The song finally ended, but another one started and Emery remained on the dance floor. It was really starting to bug Dallas because the guy she was dancing with kept pulling her up against him, and she’d have to readjust their relative positions, over and over, to get more space. Then he saw her break away as if she’d been patient long enough, and the dude grabbed her arm and whipped her back around to face him as though he wouldn’t let her leave.
A murmur rippled through those who’d noticed, and other people began to stare as it became apparent they were having a problem.
Dallas stalked over. “Something wrong?”
The guy’s head swung toward him like a bull spotting a red cape. “Nothing that’s any of your business,” he said with a sneer.
Dallas sized him up in an effort to determine, if this situation escalated, whether he’d be a real threat. Young, maybe twenty-two, he was about six foot four, two hundred and twenty pounds, and he had broad shoulders, massive biceps and beefy hands. He obviously spent lots of time pumping iron, which was probably why he thought he could be an asshole and get away with it.
He was also drunk.
“How do you know whether it’s my business or not?” Dallas asked.
“Because I wasn’t talking to you—I was talking to her.” He still had a hand clamped around Emery’s wrist. “And like I was trying to tell her, I didn’t mean to make her mad. I thought she was hot in that video. Hot’s a compliment, right?”
“That isn’t what you said.” Emery’s face was flushed, her jaw clenched. “At least not all of it.”
“You mean the part about your tits?” he said, starting to laugh. “Aw, man, come on! That was a compliment, too.”
“Let her go,” Dallas said.
“You stay out of it!” the guy snapped. “I’m trying to apologize to my famous partner here so we can finish our dance.”
Dallas lowered his voice to make it clear he wasn’t messing around. “I said let her go.”
“Dallas, it’s okay.” Emery glanced worriedly between them. “I don’t want to drag you into this. I’ll just... I’ll finish the dance. He apologized.”
“See?” The way the guy jutted out his chin acted as an exclamation point. “There’s no reason for you to get involved.”
They were making a scene, and Dallas knew she wouldn’t want that. But he’d brought her here, and he wasn’t about to let anything go wrong after she dared take the risk of coming with him. “You don’t have to dance with this drunken prick if you don’t want to,” he told her, and took her arm to lead her off the floor.
Eli and Gavin were both hurrying over as a large hand gripped Dallas’s shoulder. He felt himself being turned, but when the blow came, it mostly missed. He’d been prepared for it, had jerked his head to one side just in time. It was the other guy who was surprised when Dallas used the momentum of his turn to add power to his own punch.
His opponent looked dumbfounded at the immediate and decisive retaliation. Maybe he’d expected Dallas to start by cursing, yelling or lobbing more threats. But Dallas wasn’t about that. He was more than happy to enforce what he felt was only right.
The dude didn’t crumple to the floor as Dallas halfway expected. He shook his head as though he had to clear the cobwebs out of it. Then he touched his mouth, spotted blood on his fingertips—blood that’d come from his nose, which looked broken—and his eyes narrowed as he came after Dallas again.
“Get her home,” Dallas said, shoving a stunned Emery into the safety of Eli’s chest.
The guy managed to get both arms around Dallas and pull him down while Dallas was trying to make sure Eli got Emery clear of the action. Then, as Eli guided Emery out of the bar and Gavin held back the guy’s friend, who seemed all too eager to jump in, the fight turned into more of a wrestling match than a boxing match. But Dallas was a better wrestler than he was a boxer, anyway. Anyone who had any street fighting experience knew how important it was to be good on the ground, since almost every fight ended up there.
After narrowly escaping being pinned underneath his opponent, Dallas used all his strength and flexibility to break away and tried to jam the guy’s arm up behind his back.
The dude managed to get free before Dallas could fully achieve the hold he was striving for, but Dallas maintained his balance and used the leverage of being higher off the ground to get on top, where he pressed his sudden advantage and really let loose.
At one point, the guy succeeded in bucking him off, and they rolled around on the floor. Dallas took a few blows, but there was no pain. The only thing he felt was determination and fury. As they crashed into other people and chairs and tables, someone yelled to call the cops. After that, all sensory input dissolved into a blur. Dallas couldn’t see anything except his opponent, and he couldn’t hear anything except the blood rushing through his ears—until Gavin and several others pulled him off the stranger.
“Dallas, that’s enough,” his brother said.
The words came to him as though through a long tunnel. It didn’t feel like enough. It felt as though Dallas had barely gotten started. Although his opponent’s head had struck him in the jaw when they fell, and he could taste blood from a cut lip, he didn’t want to stop fighting. It’d been so long since he’d allowed himself this kind of outlet. Because of Aiyana and her love—and, he hoped, the maturity he’d gained as he grew older—he’d learned to channel his negative emotions into the physical exertion of climbing. But he’d grown up using his fists. Fighting was the most effective release of the anger he carried around inside him, and now he knew that remained true to this day.
It wasn’t until the moans he heard registered in his brain that he realized the other guy was still on the floor, curled in on himself, holding his face. Dallas had gotten the best of him. The dude couldn’t even get up. But Dallas wasn’t overly surprised. It didn’t matter that the guy was taller and had at least forty pounds on him. Emery’s dance partner had no idea he was dealing with someone who had a lot more experience.
Dallas preferred winning to losing, but he felt no sense of pride or achievement. He was determined this asshole wasn’t going to use his size and strength to intimidate Emery, or give her a hard time in any way, but he didn’t care about him specifically.
The person he was really fighting was his father.
And that was a fight he could never win.
* * *
Emery sat in the living room with what was left of the supplies they’d used to make the wedding favors stacked to one side. She was alone, but she wasn’t watching TV. She was reluctant to turn it on for fear the noise would awaken Aiyana or the boys. She didn’t want them to know about the fight at the bar quite yet; she felt responsible for it and wanted to be sure that Dallas was okay before she had to face his mother.
She was staring at the Christmas tree and its reflection in the window, watching the tiny lights twinkle as they appeared to race around, when she finally heard the door.
She stood, listening to his footsteps as they progressed down the hall.
“What are you doing up?” he asked the moment he saw her. “It’s really late.”
“What do you think?” she asked, slightly put out that he’d let her stew for so long. “I’ve been worried about you. Why didn’t you text me? Let me know you were okay?”
He scratched his head. “Sorry. I’ve been over at Eli’s, getting cleaned up in case my mother was awake. I didn’t want the sight of blood to freak her out, especially with her wedding next week. She’s been through enough of that sort of thing with me.”
He had a Band-Aid on his cheek, but there was no way to hide the fact that his eye was swollen or that there was a cut on his lip. “Meaning you get into fights often?”
“I used to,” he said.
She was surprised he could state it so unapologetically. She couldn’t imagine someone resorting to violence habitually. She’d never known anyone who was prone to getting into fights, which was just another reminder that they came from different worlds.
She was grateful for his help tonight, though. And for everything else he’d done, so she was oddly torn. “You’re okay?”
“I’m fine.”
She folded her arms across the sweatshirt she’d donned when she got home. “I’m sorry you had to do that. I hate that you got hurt because you were trying to protect me.”
“Doesn’t make it your fault,” he said. “That dude was asking for an ass kicking.”
“He was a jerk,” she agreed. “I didn’t want to dance with him in the first place, but I could tell he recognized me, and I just... I didn’t want him to make a big deal out of my being there. I thought if I danced with him, maybe he’d be cool and keep it to himself.”
“Considering how it turned out, that’s pretty ironic,” he said with a mirthless chuckle.
She noticed that his right hand was bandaged. “You didn’t break your hand, did you?” she asked, instantly alarmed.
“No. It’s just a sprain.”
“You’ve been to a hospital?” He’d come home late, but not late enough for that.
He laughed. “No.”
“Then how do you know?”
“I’ve broken it before,” he said simply.
Incredulous, she shook her head. “I used to report on revenge porn and bar fights... I wasn’t involved in that sort of thing.”
“You’ll get back to what you’re used to eventually.”
He was obviously spent, and she could understand why, after such a tremendous surge of adrenaline. She was feeling the effects of it, too, although she couldn’t imagine it was to the same degree. “Right,” she said so that he wouldn’t feel the need to continue to encourage her. “I’ll let you get to bed.”
“Okay. You get some rest, too. And please don’t worry about what happened tonight. You did nothing to cause it.”
“I did cause it, though—just by being at the bar.”
“You had as much right to be there as anyone else. He was the one who was out of line.”
That was true—and yet the fight wouldn’t have broken out if not for her. She kept wondering if she should’ve tolerated the idiot’s groping and suggestive language even though she could tell he was leading up to trying to get her to go home with him. “The police didn’t come, did they?” she asked as an afterthought. “You’re not in any trouble...”
“The police got there before I could leave. But they didn’t threaten to arrest me or anything. I didn’t start the fight, and there were plenty of witnesses to back that up.”
“So he’s the one who’s in trouble?”
“He could’ve been. He’s lucky it broke out on the dance floor. Even though we ran into a few tables and chairs, we didn’t break anything. So there were no property damages. And I won’t be pressing charges. The medical bills and other stuff he’ll have to contend with will be punishment enough.”
She felt her eyes widen. “Medical bills! What happened to him?”
“He has a broken nose, at least. I’m fairly certain he has a broken jaw, too. Having that wired shut for several weeks won’t be fun.”
“I’m glad it’s him and not you.”
“Me, too.” He offered her a weary smile as he started past her, and she told herself to let him go, let the evening end right there. But, for some reason, she couldn’t stop herself from reaching out to catch his arm as he went by. He was just close enough to touch and she wanted to touch him badly enough that she’d done it almost involuntarily.
He froze, but instead of meeting his gaze, even though she knew he had to be looking at her, she watched her own hand slide down the soft, tanned skin of his forearm.
He allowed her to lace her fingers through his. But then he said, “Emery...” and she knew by the tone of his voice that it was a warning.
She kept her gaze on their entwined fingers. “What?”
“I don’t have any reserves tonight. If you’re not careful, what happened on the beach will happen again.”
Finally, she lifted her eyes. “That’s just it,” she said. “I want it to.”
* * *
When he was shuffling in the back door, Dallas had been so tired and sore he could barely walk, but as he took Emery’s hand and led her down to his room, he experienced a fresh surge of energy.
At first, he was afraid she’d feel the need to do a lot of talking—to try to explain what she was thinking or feeling or determine what he was thinking or feeling so they could, once again, lay down some ground rules to avoid future trouble. She hadn’t done that when they’d started this last time; he had. But she’d nearly freaked out in the middle.
Tonight, he wasn’t in the mood to contend with any of that. That they wanted each other so badly didn’t make a lot of sense—they came from such different backgrounds and were heading down completely different paths—but in his mind it didn’t have to make sense. He was fine with the inexplicable, with random attraction, with living in the moment. But as good as Thursday had been, tonight he craved total silence. He didn’t want to hear anything or see anything. He wanted to connect with her through touch alone, to feel her bare body against his and savor the exquisite sensation he knew that would create for as long as he could stop himself from taking it further.
Fortunately, she seemed to understand his need for silence, because after all the excuses they’d allowed themselves before, this was exactly the opposite experience. They were going to take what they wanted, but he got the feeling they weren’t going to acknowledge that they were once again crossing a line they shouldn’t cross.
He didn’t switch on the light. He just closed the door behind them and turned to face her in the dark, his hands resting loosely around her waist. It was somehow more erotic that he couldn’t see even the outline of her—and that they had no business doing what they were doing.
Maybe it was the allure of the forbidden that was getting the best of them...
She didn’t move, didn’t touch him or try to kiss him. She just stood there, only an inch from him. It was almost as if they were held in place by magnetism alone. He knew it would require significant energy to pull away.
He could feel her soft breath on his face as he rested his forehead against hers. He could also feel his heart beating against his chest, and wondered if hers was thumping just as hard.
“Your room smells like you,” she whispered when he didn’t make a move.
“Is that good or bad?” He’d never noticed, never even considered it.
“It’s good. I like the way you smell.”
“I like the way you feel,” he said.
Rising up on tiptoe, she kissed him so gently he could tell she was afraid she’d hurt his busted lip.
“I’m fine,” he insisted. “You don’t have to be careful.”
Still, her tongue ran over the cut as though she was making a physical apology before lightly meeting his tongue, at which point every muscle in his body went rigid.
It’s just a kiss, he told himself, and yet it had such a powerful effect on him it nearly turned his knees to jelly.
He lifted the bottom of her sweatshirt, and she raised her arms so that he could pull it over her head. He tossed it on the floor as she removed his shirt, drawing out the anticipation as she took her time going from one button to the next. When they’d been in the living room, he hadn’t been able to tell whether she was wearing a bra—it hadn’t been obvious either way thanks to the thick material of her sweatshirt—but he’d guessed she wasn’t and he’d been right.
As he ran his fingers down the smooth skin on either side of her spine, she leaned forward just enough that her nipples grazed his bare chest. “That has to be one of the best things I’ve ever felt,” he said and, reaching up to cup her breast, lowered his head to take her nipple in his mouth.
The moment he heard her sigh, he knew he wouldn’t be able to continue the slow pace they’d set for much longer. Slipping his good hand inside her yoga pants, he said, “Take these off.”
After she complied, he lifted her onto his bed and spread her knees apart as he climbed on with her. She reached for his zipper, but he gently knocked her hands to the side so that he could kiss his way up her thigh.
She was quivering as he neared his target, but then her legs suddenly snapped together as though she’d deny him access. “I feel too vulnerable for that,” she said with a nervous laugh.
“Vulnerable? Or self-conscious? Because there’s no reason to be self-conscious with me. But if you really don’t want me to—”
“It’s not that I don’t want you to...”
“Then let me,” he whispered. And not only did she allow him to open her legs, her hands fisted in his hair, her back arched and he heard her groan in spite of how quiet they were trying to be when he touched her with his tongue.